


The Trade in Tears

by Prochytes



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-25
Updated: 2011-04-25
Packaged: 2017-10-18 15:58:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,203
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/190585
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Prochytes/pseuds/Prochytes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There is a right way and a wrong way of doing things.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Trade in Tears

**Author's Note:**

> No spoilers. Originally posted on LJ in 2009.

The boar was to blame. Boars often were. Half of Uther’s knights traced testimony in scars to what twice a hundredweight of angry pig could do. But most boars made trouble _before_ they died.

The boar in question, a splendid beast, had been given to Uther by Sir Peverel. The gift was part of a traditional one from those lands to their liege as the year waned. Such munificence did not come easily to Peverel at present; the late dearth had hit his estates harder than most. This made the tribute all the more important, of course. It sent a message to those who might be tempted to try the strength of Peverel’s lands that he and his people had not lost their grip.

Uther was no Lucullus, and the pleasures of the table held little appeal to Morgana. But so strong a statement of fealty could not go unacknowledged. Thus it was that they had spent the evening forcing down a meal which had yielded them scant enjoyment, as a gift from a man who could ill afford to give it.

The knowledge of this had left Morgana restive. Her displeasure was the more trying for its obliquity. Had his ward been a simple scold, Uther would have borne her tirades with equanimity – provided, of course, that she did not overstep the mark. But Morgana was to be a great lady, and she worked otherwise. Not for her, unless moved beyond endurance, the expression of open ire. Morgana erected discontent on arched eyebrows and load-bearing hints and the countless other recourses of the diplomat’s craft. Her conversation, like Arthur’s swordplay, was an asset that had been honed at Uther’s insistence throughout the years he had raised them. As with Arthur’s swordplay, he was sometimes a little taken aback by his own success.

“It will be a harsh winter.” Morgana paused with her goblet at her lips, and darted a glance at Uther over it. “The young people have never known the like. Some of them say that they would even see the warlocks and witches return, if it would put food on their tables.”

Uther snorted. “Then the young people are seditious fools. Let them go to their elders, and ask there what magic brings.”

“And what, my lord, would their elders say to them?” Above the goblet, Morgana’s gaze was steady. “What was it like, before you drove the magic from these lands?”

“Be thankful it is a memory you are spared.” Uther took a long pull of his wine, and stared into the fire. “I recall once… but no matter.”

“My lord?”

“It is of no consequence.”

“Yet I would hear it, all the same.”

Uther hated stories.

He hated their slick facility: the way they topped and tailed the awkward edges of the real with Once Upon a Times and Ever Afters. He hated the places of their nurture, the taprooms and kitchens where old men and women clucked over them, eyes moist with spite, putting calluses upon petty slights and imagined wrongs. But he hated most how they waxed unseen, more bloated in each retelling, without due bound or limit to their burgeon. No; if stories had a place in Camelot, that place was marshalled on parade for all to see, in the serried ranks of annals and court chronicles. Uther had ordered the founding of Geoffrey’s library at the same time he had established the Castle Armoury. Some fancied this a coincidence.

But stories were insidious, and crept up on you. Before he could check himself, the words were on his tongue:

“It was in the early days of the Great Purge, a few moons before the Rain of Songs. Four days from Camelot, we rode into a village. The village folk would not speak of it, at first. But the spent pyre on the green and the smell of burnt flesh spoke enough. Gaius needed but little time to determine what had unfolded there.

“A woman of the village had lost her son. Her grief – how could it be otherwise? – was beyond measure. On the night of her son’s death, a tall, thin man came to her door. A leather sack swung from his shoulder. His eyes did not move in his face.

“The man said that he was a trader. The woman tried to send him on his way, for she had nothing to sell, and no wish to buy. The trader disagreed. ‘You do have something to sell’, he said. And his finger traced the path of tears along her cheek.”

Uther paused, and reached for his goblet. Morgana had leaned forward in her chair, intent upon the story. Looking at her, at times such as this (the skin so pale, the eyes so bright), he was obscurely reminded of another, who had no welcome in his domain. A harebrained thought, which a mouthful of wine soon despatched. He set the cup back on the table, and continued:

“The woman thought the trader a madman, of course, yet he persisted in his offer: fifty gold coins for all her tears. Fool that she was, the offer tempted her. Her grief was a sore burden, and the gold would profit her family. In the end, she agreed to his terms. The trader counted out fifty gold coins, and went on his way.

“The woman returned to her grieving family. They wept; she did not. The other villagers came to pay their respects, as was meet and proper. They wept; she did not. Dark whispers began, amongst the people. What mother was this woman, that she could not weep for her son? Too late, the woman saw what she had peddled away. She resolved to find the trader, and buy back what she had lost.

“At last she tracked him to a caravan. The trader sat there amongst other folk, tall and thin as himself. When she sought trade with him once more, he laughed, and pointed to a place by the fire, where, it seemed, the children of the camp played at marbles. She looked at the game more closely, and understood. ‘I cannot sell you back your tears’, the trader said. ‘What would our children use for tokens then?’ The woman who could not weep returned to her village. There, some days later, she ended herself. The villagers burned her body on a pyre, so that all might see where consort with magic ends.”

Uther drained his goblet, and rose from his chair. “Not a pretty tale, by any means, but instructive, nonetheless. Good night, Morgana.”

“Good night, my lord.”

After Uther left, Morgana passed into a reverie, from which she was roused only by a gentle tap upon her elbow. She looked up, and smiled at the earnest face above her.

“Good evening, my lady. I hope that dinner with the King went well?”

“As well as could be expected, Gwen.”

“You seemed very thoughtful. Is something the matter?”

“Not at all, Gwen. I was simply… wondering.”

Gwen cocked her head on one side. “‘Wondering’, my lady? May I ask what?”

Morgana looked at the empty chair opposite her own. “Nothing of consequence. I just wonder to whom Uther sold histears.”

FINIS


End file.
